Look Me in the Eye: My Life with Asperger's

Ever since he was small, John Robison had longed to connect with other people, but by the time he was a teenager, his odd habits, an inclination to blurt out non sequiturs, avoid eye contact, dismantle radios, and dig five-foot holes, had earned him the label "social deviant". No guidance came from his mother or his father. It was no wonder he gravitated to machines, which could, at least, be counted on.

Be Different: Adventures of a Free-Range Aspergian with Practical Advice for Aspergians, Misfits, Families & Teachers

John Robison argues that Asperger's is about difference, not disability. In this book he offers stories from his own life and from the lives of other Aspergians to give the reader a window into the Aspergian mind. Equally important, he offers practical advice - to Aspergians, their parents, and educators - on how Asperians can improve the weak communication and social skills that keep them from taking full advantage of, or even recognizing, their often remarkable gifts.

Raising Cubby: A Father and Son's Adventures with Asperger's, Trains, Tractors, and High Explosives

Misfit, truant, delinquent. John Robison was never a model child, and he wasn’t a model dad either. Diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome at the age of 40, he approached fatherhood as a series of logic puzzles and practical jokes. When his son, Cubby, asked, “Where did I come from?” John said he’d bought him at the Kid Store and that the salesman had cheated him by promising Cubby would “do all chores”. He read electrical engineering manuals to Cubby at bedtime.

NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity

What is autism: a lifelong disability or a naturally occurring form of cognitive difference akin to certain forms of genius? In truth, it is both of these things and more - and the future of our society depends on our understanding it. Wired reporter Steve Silberman unearths the secret history of autism, long suppressed by the same clinicians who became famous for discovering it, and finds surprising answers to the crucial question of why the number of diagnoses has soared in recent years.

Lust & Wonder: A Memoir

In chronicling the development and demise of the different relationships he's had while living in New York, Augusten Burroughs examines what it means to be in love, what it means to be in lust, and what it means to be figuring it all out. With Augusten's unique and singular observations and his own unabashed way of detailing both the horrific and the humorous, Lust & Wonder is an intimate and honest memoir that his legions of fans have been waiting for.

In a Different Key: The Story of Autism

Nearly 75 years ago, Donald Triplett of Forest, Mississippi, became the first child diagnosed with autism. Beginning with his family's odyssey, In a Different Key tells the extraordinary story of this often misunderstood condition and of the civil rights battles waged by the families of those who have it. Unfolding over decades, it is a beautifully rendered history of ordinary people determined to secure a place in the world for those with autism.

The Autistic Brain: Thinking Across the Spectrum

Temple Grandin teaches listeners the science of the autistic brain, and with it the history and sociology of autism. By being autistic--by being able to look from the inside out and from the outside in--the author's insights are not just unique, they're groundbreaking. According to Temple, our understanding of autism has been perhaps fundamentally wrong for the past 70 years.

The Way I See It: A Personal Look at Autism & Asperger's (Revised and Expanded Edition)

In this innovative audiobook, Dr. Temple Grandin gets down to the REAL issues of autism, the ones parents, teachers, and individuals on the spectrum face every day. Temple offers helpful do's and don'ts, practical strategies, and try-it-now tips, all based on her "insider" perspective and a great deal of research. This revised and expanded edition contains revisions based on the most current autism research, as well as 14 additional articles.

Free Refills: A Doctor Confronts His Addiction

Dr. Peter Grinspoon seemed to be a total success: a Harvard-educated MD with a thriving practice; married with two great kids and a gorgeous wife; a pillar of his community. But lurking beneath the thin veneer of having it all was an addict fueled on a daily boatload of prescription meds. When the police finally came calling - after a tip from a sharp-eyed pharmacist - Grinspoon's house of cards came tumbling down fast.

Running with Scissors: A Memoir

Running with Scissors is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of being Anne Sexton) gave him away to be raised by her psychiatrist, a dead ringer for Santa and a lunatic in the bargain.

Lab Girl

Acclaimed scientist Hope Jahren has built three laboratories in which she's studied trees, flowers, seeds, and soil. Her first book might have been a revelatory treatise on plant life. Lab Girl is that, but it is also so much more. Because in it, Jahren also shares with us her inspiring life story, in prose that takes your breath away.

On Living

As a hospice chaplain, Kerry Egan didn't offer sermons or prayers unless they were requested; in fact, she found, the dying rarely want to talk about God, at least not overtly. Instead she discovered she'd been granted an invaluable chance to witness firsthand what she calls the "spiritual work of dying" - the work of finding or making meaning of one's life, the experiences it's contained, and the people who have touched it, the betrayals, wounds, unfinished business, and unrealized dreams.

At the age of 36, on the verge of completing a decade's worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated.

Twirling Naked in the Streets and No One Noticed: Growing Up with Undiagnosed Autism

Jeannie grew up with autism, but no one around her knew it. Twirling Naked in the Streets will take you on a journey into the mind of a child on the autism spectrum; a child who grows into an adolescent, an adult, and becomes a wife, mother, student, and writer with autism.

An Extraordinary Time: The End of the Postwar Boom and the Return of the Ordinary Economy

A sweeping reappraisal of the last sixty years of world history, An Extraordinary Time describes how the postwar economic boom dissipated, undermining faith in government, destabilizing the global financial system, and forcing us to come to terms with how tumultuous our economy really is.

Black Man in a White Coat: A Doctor's Reflections on Race and Medicine

One doctor's passionate and profound memoir of his experience grappling with racial identity, bias, and the unique health problems of black Americans. When Damon Tweedy first enters the halls of Duke University Medical School on a full scholarship, he envisions a bright future where his segregated, working-class background will become largely irrelevant. Instead he finds that he has joined a new world where race is front and center.

The Trainable Cat: A Practical Guide to Making Life Happier for You and Your Cat

Dog owners know that dogs can be trained, but the idea of training rarely crosses cat owners' minds. But as best-selling anthrozoologist John Bradshaw and cat expert Sarah Ellis show, not only can cats be trained, but they absolutely should be to ensure a happy and healthy relationship between pet and owner. Once we comprehend cats' emotions and needs, we can train them to overcome their natural fears and anxieties.

They're Playing Our Song: A Memoir

Grammy and Academy Award-winning songwriter Carole Bayer Sager shares the remarkably frank and darkly funny story of her life in and out of the recording studio, from her fascinating (and sometimes calamitous) relationships to her collaborations with some of the greatest composers and musical artists of our time.

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis

Hillbilly Elegy is a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis - that of white working-class Americans. The decline of this group, a demographic of our country that has been slowly disintegrating over 40 years, has been reported on with growing frequency and alarm but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck.

Seeing Voices: A Journey Into the World of the Deaf

In Seeing Voices, Oliver Sacks turns his attention to the subject of deafness, and the result is a deeply felt portrait of a minority struggling for recognition and respect - a minority with its own rich, sometimes astonishing, culture and unique visual language, an extraordinary mode of communication that tells us much about the basis of language in hearing people as well.

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat: and Other Clinical Tales

Oliver Sacks' The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat tells the stories of individuals afflicted with fantastic perceptual and intellectual aberrations: patients who have lost their memories and with them the greater part of their pasts; who are no longer able to recognize people and common objects; who are stricken with violent tics and grimaces or who shout involuntary obscenities; whose limbs have become alien; who have been dismissed as retarded yet are gifted with uncanny artistic or mathematical talents.

Love That Boy: What Two Presidents, Eight Road Trips, and My Son Taught Me About a Parent's Expectations

Love That Boy is a uniquely personal story about the causes and costs of outsized parental expectations. What we want for our children - popularity, normalcy, achievement, genius - and what they truly need - grit, empathy, character - are explored by National Journal's Ron Fournier, who weaves his extraordinary journey to acceptance around the latest research on childhood development and stories of other loving-but-struggling parents.

Capture: Unraveling the Mystery of Mental Suffering

Why do we think, feel, and act in ways we wish we did not? For decades, New York Times best-selling author Dr. David A. Kessler has studied this question with regard to tobacco, food, and drugs. Over the course of these investigations, he identified one underlying mechanism common to a broad range of human suffering. This phenomenon - capture - is the process by which our attention is hijacked and our brains commandeered by forces outside our control.

Publisher's Summary

An extraordinary memoir about the cutting-edge brain therapy that dramatically changed the life and mind of John Elder Robison, the New York Times best-selling author of Look Me in the Eye.

Imagine spending the first 40 years of your life in darkness, blind to the emotions and social signals of other people. Then imagine that someone suddenly switches the lights on.

John Elder Robison's best-selling memoir, Look Me in the Eye, is one of the most beloved accounts of life with autism. In Switched On, Robison shares the second part of his journey, pushing the boundaries of scientific discovery as he undergoes an experimental brain therapy known as TMS, or transcranial magnetic stimulation. TMS drastically changes Robison's life. After 40 years of feeling like a social misfit - either misreading other people's emotions or missing them completely and accepting this as his fate - Robison can suddenly sense a powerful range of emotion in others as a result of the treatments: "It was as if I'd been experiencing the world in black and white all my life, and suddenly I could see everything - and particularly other people - in brilliant, beautiful color." The ability to connect emotionally with others for the first time brings Robison a kind of joy he has never known.

And yet, Robison's newfound insight has very real downsides. As the emotional ground shifts beneath his feet, he must find a way to move forward without losing sight of who he is, what he values, and all he has worked so hard for. Robison is our guinea pig and our guide, bravely leading us on an adventure that holds the key to new ways of understanding the mysteries of the human brain. In this real-life Flowers for Algernon, he grapples with a trade-off - the very real possibility that choosing to diminish his disability might also mean sacrificing his unique gifts and even some of his closest relationships.

Switched On is a fascinating and intimate window into what it means to be neurologically different and what happens when the world as you know it is upended overnight.

What the Critics Say

"A fascinating companion to the previous memoirs by this masterful storyteller." (Kirkus Reviews)

"Switched On is a mind-blowing book that will force you to ask deep questions about what is important in life. Would normalizing the brains of those who think differently reduce their motivation for great achievement?" (Temple Grandin, author of The Autistic Brain)

"John Elder Robison is an extraordinary guide, carefully elucidating the cutting-edge science behind this revolutionary new brain therapy, TMS, alongside the compelling story of the impact it has on his relationships, his thinking and emotions, and indeed his very identity. At the heart of Switched On are fundamental questions of who we are, of where our identity resides, of difference and disability and free will, which are brought into sharp focus by Robison's lived experience." (Graeme Simsion, author of The Rosie Effect)

This book (which is part memoir and part Neuro for Newbies textbook) tells the personal story of the author's participation in and response to clinical research trials investigating the effects of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) on the social and emotional intelligence of adults with Asperger's syndrome. Robison's response to TMS is nothing short of life-changing; everything from his marriage and family, to his career as a business owner, to his avocations as a music aficionado and amateur photographer is shaken to its very foundations and emerges completely altered. Anyone even slightly interested in autism spectrum disorders and/or brain research will be hooked from the very first chapters.

The book's only drawbacks--one related to content, one to performance--are ironically both likely related to the author's status as an Aspie. First, he writes like an Aspie, with fully competent grammar, usage and sentence mechanics, but a somewhat pedantic style, with perhaps an overreliance on technical details. Secondly, he reads his own words, which on the one hand is great (makes his memoir feel more authentic; makes the emotion more palpably real), but on the other hand will pose a problem for listeners who are easily put off by a less-than-stellar narrator. As a speech therapist, I couldn't help but cringe as I listened to his decreased respiratory support resulting in short breath groups of four to six words separated by pauses. For example, he reads like this: "As Howard Gardner first wrote....decades ago in Multiple Intelligences.... there are a variety.... of distinct intellectual capacities and orientations....that contribute to our understanding....of ourselves and our place....in society.” That's a lot of pauses, and DOES make the techie parts sound more boring than they need to, as well as distracting somewhat from the emotional impact of the more emotional parts of the story. I recommend either listening at 1.25 x normal speed, or supplementing listening to the Audible book by simultaneously reading the print version. I did both, and was VERY glad I did! Highly recommended.

The book is an anecdotal account of the author's experience of taking TMS (transcranal magnetic stimulation), as an experimental treatment for autism (he'll often use the word Asperger instead of 'autism'). The author is a good narrator, and tells his personnel experiences in a very likable manner.

Overall, I think I could have gotten what I wanted out of the book by reading a magazine length article on the merits and wizardry on TMS instead. I had wondered about the efficacy of the procedure before reading this book, and to the author's credit, I still wonder because he doesn't go beyond what the current science says and much more science needs to be done before easy answers can be given.

If you are on the spectrum and introspective you will likely find this fascinating. If you are not, you could be frustrated and/or bored at the tedium of getting thru the whole thing. As an autistic person I can only say that I see a point to almost every word. Some chapters will seem pointless to one person and be the most captivating to another so nobody should say 'it would have been better (more bearable) without this or that chapter'. You likely would remove the most interesting part for some other reader.I don't think the point of reading is that it's a captivating story even though many may find it so. To me it's a must read for anyone who IS or lives with a high functioning autistic person. I recommend it to those who are on the spectrum because it gives a fascinating and credible basis for thinking about ones place in the world and some practical consequences of changing that place. For the rest, it's never as credible to hear a person with Asperger syndrome explain that they do care even though, from all outward appearances, they don't. John has earned a voice on the national and international stages, not by who he knows but by being truly insightful and articulate while speaking from first hand experience. While he may not be able to speak for every autistic person, his descriptions and insights into how many of us think and feel is very realistic and generally quite close to the mark. I encourage anyone having regular contact with someone on the spectrum to not only read what he says about how we think but believe it and use it as a basis to take what those you know say seriously.

I listened to it after I finished "Look Me In The Eyes" and it was strange adjusting to a new voice. You come to associate the voice with the author and story. But once I got over that, this book was so interesting, I found myself going, "WOW!" all throughout the book. A must read for everyone, not only educators and parents, to get a glimpse of life from this different perspective. It just might help you understand people you know and work with every day!

If you like to know about accepting oneself, and personal growth-this is the book to have.

What did you like best about this story?

Hearing the growing that went on. It was so exciting to hear it. I can't begin to explain how inspired I am every time I hear one of the author's books. I'm honored he shared so much about his struggles and his challenges because it shows us that if you put your mind to it- anything is possible, but not without hard work and perseverance. That is ever present in all aspects of his life. Failure is never an option for Mr Robison.

Have you listened to any of John Elder Robison’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

The intonation in his voice. I have now been looking for him online to hear his motivational speeches.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Little Bear. I cannot write about her without deep sadness. I don't know that I would've felt Mr. Robison's pain had he not chosen to work so hard on himself.

Both as a reader and a Cognitive Scientist, this story is phenomenal, educational, and breath taking. I would recommend it to anyone who has the faintest interest in: the brain and the mind, autism, struggles, life, love, humans.

While the authors story is mostly positive, he describes a frightening future in which we manipulate children's brains to "cure" them of deficiency. As has been seen with the rampant dispensing of mostly useless pharmaceuticals, psychiatrists can't be trusted with such power.

If you enjoy learning about Temple Grandin, John Robison's story is equally compelling. After being introduced to John in 2011 at IMFAR, I read his first two books. When Raising Cubby came out, I devoured that one too. This is his best book yet. If you have Asperger's or autism, or if you care about people who do, this book is for you. John does a great job of describing his life and experience with autism. He also tackles the job of explaining how scientists are using their knowledge gained from years of research to develop promising treatments that will eventually be available to those of us outside research institutions. Read the book, treatments are within site. The next steps will include training the masses. It cannot come too soon!